I've only had my hones for less than a week, so take my advice with a grain of salt (and a shot of penicillin)

Personally, I can feel a HUGE difference between the edge off a shapton glass 8k and 16k. The 16k is much smoother.

However, I'm not using any kind of paste. I go straight from my shapton 16k to my SRD web fabric and latigo strop, and then to my face.